II. This second part of the Article is twofold.

(1) The ceremonial and civil laws were abolished by Christ's Gospel. St. Paul distinctly condemns those who wished to enforce the Jewish ceremonial on Gentile Christians (Gal. iv. 9, 10, v. 2); the Epistle to the Hebrews says plainly that the New Covenant superseded the Old Covenant, the old being "ready to vanish away" when the new came (viii. 13). That the civil polity of the Jews cannot be the model for modern nations is plain, for no modern nation is a theocracy: Christ's kingdom is not a kingdom of this world. The kingdoms of this world have their human governments; and a human governor would do wrong to enforce his authority in matters that lie between the soul and God, though a Divine Governor might. Hence modern governments are wisely content to legislate against crime, that is, civil or social offences, only; whereas the Law of Moses extended to all sins, whether against God or man, being administered by a Divine Governor.

(2) The moral part of the Mosaic Law is still in force, being based on those principles of justice and truth which are eternal. "The righteousness of the Law is fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit" (Rom. viii. 4). So far from abrogating the moral commandments of God, Christ made them more stringent in His Sermon on the Mount. Speaking of this portion of the Law He said, "I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil" (that is, complete or perfect) "the Law" (Matt. v. 17).

This latter part of the Article is, therefore, as fully justified by Scripture as the former part.

ARTICLE VIII.

Of the Three Creeds.

The Three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed: for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture.

Notes.-Nicene Creed. So called, because it was drawn up, so far as the words "And I believe in the Holy Ghost," at the Council of Nicæa, A.D. 325. The latter words, "The Lord and Giver of life," to the end, were added at the Council of Constantinople, A.D. 381, -a Council summoned to condemn the Macedonian heretics, who denied the Deity of the Holy Spirit.

Athanasius's Creed. So called, because it sets forth the great doctrine of which St. Athanasius was the resolute defender. But the Creed was clearly drawn up not by a Greek, but by a Latin Father; nor can it well have been composed earlier than St. Augustine's time, as it repeats many of his phrases, and contains the doctrine of the Holy Spirit's Procession from the Son, which St. Augustine was the first to bring prominently forward. That it was drawn up, however, before the rise of the Eutychian heresy is evident. The Eutychians denied that Christ had two distinct Natures (human and divine): and, had the Creed been framed after their time, the doctrine of the two distinct Natures would have been more emphatically asserted ;-certainly the 35th verse of the Creed ("For as the reasonable soul and flesh is

one man, so God and man is one Christ ") would have been omitted. Of course, the verse means, "As soul and flesh make one person in a man, so God and man in Christ make one Person," but obviously it might be construed to mean, "As soul and flesh make one nature in a man, so God and man make one Nature in Christ," which would be Eutychianism, merging the two natures into One. The most probable date of the Creed is therefore between A.D. 400 and 450.

There is a MS. of it as old as A.D. 600, and a Commentary on it of still older date (570).

The Apostles' Creed has been spoken of in former Manuals. This eighth Article, in accordance with the principle laid down in the sixth, rests our Church's acceptance of these Creeds on their being warranted by Scripture.

:

This point--the authority of the Church's Creedsneeds further enlargement, for it is often misunderstood. We do not claim for the Creeds that they are inspired documents. But we claim this for them:that they stand in the same relation to the facts of Revelation, in which Kepler's Laws of Motion, or Newton's Principia, stand to the facts of nature. They have been arrived at by an inductive process of reasoning, as vigorous and scientific, as that by which the principles of mechanics or of astronomy have been arrived at.

The great scientific theologians of the third and fourth centuries were students of Revelation as conscientious and profound as the great natural philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Just as Bacon, Kepler, Descartes, Leibnitz, Newton, had before them facts of nature, classified those facts,

induced upon them certain general ideas, which seemed to explain them, and so by a process of careful verification, arrived at the laws of nature ;—even so Athanasius, the two Gregories, Jerome, Augustine, and the other great theologians of the fourth and fifth centuries, had before them the facts of Revelation, carefully compared those facts, induced upon them certain general ideas which seemed to harmonize them, and so by a no less strictly inductive process, arrived at the doctrines of theology; and these doctrines of theology, which find expression in the Athanasian Creed for instance, have been continually verified by succeeding ages, and have been found to explain the facts of Revelation so perfectly and satisfactorily, that they have come to be accepted by the whole Church with a confidence as justifiable as that with which astronomers accept the principles of Newton.

The doctrines of the Trinity and the Atonement are not to be found written down in express terms in the records of Revelation, any more than are the laws of motion or gravitation to be found imprinted on the face of nature; but they are no less certain, and have been arrived at by a process of inductive reasoning no less rigorously scientific.

This, and no less than this, is asserted in this Article, when it declares that the Creeds " ought thoroughly to be received and believed, for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture.”

LESSON V.

OF SIN AND THE PARDON OF SIN.

OR

ARTICLE IX.

Of Original or Birth-sin.

RIGINAL Sin standeth not in the following of Adam, (as the Pelagians do vainly talk;) but it is the fault and corruption of the Nature of every man, that naturally is ingendered of the offspring of Adam; whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that the flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit; and therefore in every person born into this world, it deserveth God's wrath and damnation.

And this infection of nature doth remain, yea in them that are regenerated; whereby the lust of the flesh, called in Greek, Opóvnμa σаρкòs, which some do expound the wisdom, some sensuality, some the affection, some the desire, of the flesh, is not subject to the Law of God. And although there is no condemnation for them that believe and are baptized, yet the Apostle doth confess, that con